Nomination for an Environment Award, 2025.

Finely detailed brickwork is the feature in this new development on the corner of Macfarlane Road and Wood Lane opposite Westfield, designed by Maccreanor Lavington for Peabody Housing Association. It replaces the former BBC car park with a pair of appropriately-sized mid-rise buildings, providing 142 affordable homes in a mixture of shared ownership, London Affordable Rent and London Living Rent with 68 x 1 bed, 67 x 2 bed and 7 x 3-bed flats.

Macfarlane Place – H&C railway line – Westfield Living in the distance, TV centre tower under construction left

Macfarlane Place for Peabody Housing Association

Macfarlane Place – Wood Lane & public realm

Macfarlane Place – railway line

Macfarlane Place for Peabody Housing Association

Macfarlane Place – entrance

Macfarlane Place – brickwork shutters railings

Macfarlane Road – public realm

There are some echoes of the ‘warehouse chic’ of the 2023 award-winning Hoxton hotel just down the road, plus an echo of the red brick DIMCO buildings on the other side of Wood Lane, which were themselves nominated in 2021.

The use of materials is interesting, and although there is some fakery to the brickwork (common these days), the patterns are original, and the floor to ceiling windows and detailing lift the facades above the ordinary allowing it to not shout ‘social housing’.  Care has been used in the design, and as the RIBA journal notes, it has tenant-friendly touches such as heat-regulating shutters.  The shutters are said to have been designed to reduce overheating, eliminating the need for air conditioning and opening windows onto a potentially noisy Wood Lane, and the Hammersmith & City railway line immediately adjacent. There’s some interesting detailing internally too.  There are a few more photos on our Instagram

Nomination for an Nancye Goulden Award, 2025.

Hidden away down a tiny lane known as Dimes Place just off King Street, is a new commercial development known as The New Timber Yard, because it was formerly the home of Moss Timber Merchants (by Royal Appointment, specialist Timber Merchant).  Having been established for over a hundred years, they moved out to Greenford around 2016, and for a couple of years Dimes Place appeared regularly on our agenda for various reasons, including a change of developer, changes and densification of design, according to the Chairman’s annual report. The site has a lot of adjacency with neighbours all around as the photos show, and the site is somewhat Tardis-like, in that what you see from the street is very much less than the whole.

The New Timber Yard – Dimes Place

The New Timber Yard – Dimes Place

The New Timber Yard – Dimes Place

The New Timber Yard – Argyle Place

The New Timber Yard

The New Timber Yard – shared courtyard with external kitchen

The New Timber Yard

The New Timber Yard – logo

The New Timber Yard – reception

However, the end result it’s a world away from the hustle and noise of King Street, with attractive planting down the former roadway, taking you to a not insubstantial 200sqm office development, built to BREEAM ‘excellent’ standards, with a welcoming reception area.  Tucked away past the shared courtyard with pizza oven and BBQ are further offices, which were – according to the planning portal – originally intended as mews houses, where the former woodsheds were located between the backs of the houses in Cambridge Grove and Argyle Place.  There are a few more photos on our Instagram

This is what the site used to look like (click for larger images):

Moss Hammersmith
[Photo: Moss & co]

Moss Hammersmith
[Photo: Moss & co]

Dimes Place (planning)

Nomination for a Wooden Spoon, 2025.

The Hammersmith Belle

The former Hampshire Hog / Hampshire has struggled in recent years, changing hands, names and formats several times, including in the midst of the pandemic in 2020. It used to have a restrained image commensurate with its elegant 1883 Victorian architecture – see below.

In its most recent incarnation it has joined the Belle pubs and restaurants group as the Hammersmith Belle, and taken on their standard sports bar brand appearance with fake LED-lit mini-trees outside, described in the nomination as having the appearance of a ‘Bulgarian Black Sea beach resort’ (who knew? – Ed).

This fits with an increasing trend for pandemic-inspired pavement encroachments, in a way that can erode the character of a city – building by building – and in the same way that the Uxbridge Road petitioners have mentioned. These do actually require planning consent, and should be the subject of enforcement. In this case, as many, no consent exists.

While it’s good to see this large longstanding establishment being reinvigorated – and in its original function – despite the 4.6 Google review ratings, the unsympathetic paint scheme, the brand’s generic plastic trees, loud signage, and pavement encroachments don’t seem to do the streetscape or building justice. Rather than help make the case for a vibrant sports bar, the additions seem to detract from an otherwise valiant effort to improve the frontage with its many thriving window boxes, and planting in the garish containers next to the trees, which unlike them, is actually real.

For reference, the appearance is shown below – from 2016:

The Hampshire Hog, 2016 [photo: Edward Hands / Wikipedia]

Nomination for a Nancye Goulden Award, 2025.

Bradmore Square is a small space tucked away behind Bradmore House on the Broadway, with which we and the Historic Buildings Group have a long history. The back entrance to Hammersmith tube and bus station, and the increasingly popular Broadway shopping centre is conveniently adjacent.  Recently the public realm has been noticeably improved.

Bradmore Square 3

Bradmore Square 2

Bradmore Square 1

The nomination notes that “it’s additionally impressive that the pots continue to be green and watered, even throughout the dry weather that we have been having”.

Nomination for a Nancye Goulden Award, 2025.

The replacement of the bus lane in King Street by a temporary cycle lane during the pandemic was not without it’s critics, including in this parish, given its impact on public transport – particularly with the problematic ‘floating bus stops’ pictured, plus the effect on the public realm – two of our top concerns.

But the recent creation of two rain gardens, together with gravel replacements for a significant number of tree pits on both sides of the western end of the street represent very significant improvements. The hard landscaping and tree pits were done by Conway under the council’s mandate, paid for by the Green Investment Scheme, but interestingly, the planting was undertaken by HCGA under contract to the council, partly by local volunteers.

King St rain gardens

King St rain gardens

King St rain gardens

The gardens are already maturing after only a few weeks and will surely only get better in time. The adjacent gravel tree pits are a perfect example of what the society has campaigned on for well over a decade, awarding wooden spoons to the council in successive years for failing to improve the ‘asphalt situation’ around the borough’s trees. It didn’t seem to take Conway very long to dig out the old asphalt in around a dozen pits, and replace it with permeable and attractive real gravel. These represent what we’d like to see by default everywhere – of course in creative cooperation with guerrilla gardeners such as the award-winning Askew in Bloom, and The Green Project where they’re planting too. 

Nomination for a Wooden Spoon, 2024

Planting at 181 Talgarth Road – the new Premier Inn and PBSA, still under construction

181 Talgarth Road border planting

181 Talgarth Road Premier Inn planting

The small bed which is the first thing you see as you arrive at the Premier Inn from Hammersmith underground station is almost bare, and compares especially badly after the very good planting at The Ark next door.

The planters to mask the new building from the houses in Margravine Road are nearly dead and planted in what looks like builders rubble not compost, which makes it unsurprising that they won’t grow.

Nomination for a Tom Ryland Award for Conservation, 2024

The office of Beata Heuman

Beata Heuman, 188 Hammersmith Road – exterior

188 Hammersmith Road – exterior (night)

See Beata Heuman and House and Garden

Nominated by a member who says  “There are often members of the public taking photos of this building, especially at night, as it is beautifully lit as well as sympathetically restored. It is a joy to walk by. The small “Wildlife” Garden is very well tended and is a great addition to having some plants and greenery to admire along this road”